


Twigs ’n Berries in the Garden

by elwinglyre



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Although it’s an act, Angst, But Crowley wants more, But it is an act for those Above (and below…maybe), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Rape/Non-con Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:47:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21902491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elwinglyre/pseuds/elwinglyre
Summary: Written for Good Omens Kink MemeThis is the prompt given: Aziraphale/Crowley, non-con or dub-con, garden of Eden, early days darker!CrowleyI have this idea that early Crowley (Garden of Eden era) was way less noble and way more "demonic" and also harboring a lot of ill-will towards angels, BUT is also clearly very intrigued by Aziraphale and instantly lusts for him. I'd love a fic in which he does a hard sell temptation into extreme dubcon territory in Eden (after they meet on the wall?) OR it can even go so far as non-con.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 59
Kudos: 179
Collections: Good Omens Kink Meme





	1. Chapter 1

He took the bite. Juice from the apple dribbled down Adam's chin. The demon's job was done...or just begun. It depended how long he was going to spend here on Earth. It depended on the wrath of God and if this would remain Paradise.

He wound around the branch of the tree, diamond-shaped head peeking out between the leaves.

As the sky opened and God called down his judgment from above, Adam and Eve covered themselves.

The demon listened to the verdict echo: Pain in child birth. _Good._ Thrown out of Eden. _Better_. _Paradise was so tedious_. But serpents required to crawl on their bellies and eat earth for the rest of its days? Why? Because one demon didn't agree with keeping all knowledge hidden to man? He liked slithering, but...he needed legs and a way to get around.

If he must stay, he'd shed this serpent form. Crawling on the earth on his belly had no appeal, but he would miss his shimmering emerald scales.

At least _he_ could throw off this form although he hated to do so completely. The demon liked basking in the sun, warming himself. He enjoyed his heat-seeking eyes that found mice. But he simply adored his environmentally omniscient tongue, flicking and tasting the cool grasses.

The demon watched the couple stand dumbfounded and alone with their knowledge. He didn't understand it at all. He knew it wasn't up to him, but it seemed wrong to forbid knowledge no matter what kind it was. It was this same thinking that caused his Fall (or saunter or slither or whatever way) from Heaven. It didn't matter. He ended up here.

The demon's attention turned from the two lovers to a sudden movement in the bushes. His serpent senses caught a halo of unearthly essence emanating from behind the shroud of leaves. His forked tongue flicked about, testing the air. Was that a hint of ambrosia he detected?

 _Ahhh. An angel_! Most likely sent by Gabriel to interfere and spy on him.

"You've arrived too late," Crawly hissed out. "Too late, angel! No thwarting temptation for you today. Begone with you."

Crawly waited, coiling his tail around a branch on the tree, but the angel remained hidden. He pushed his head out from behind the leaves to get a better taste.

"If you aren't going to leave at least look at the two of them running off into the wilderness! They already cover themselves in shame."

Crawly slithered down to a lower branch to get a look at the little spy. He let himself drop softly down to the ground and slipped silently through the long grass.He got that and more. He saw the angel's face and the frown he wore. How dare he frown at the couple? How dare this angel judge _them_?

He quietly slithered behind the angel.

"Too late," he hissed again.

The angel jumped, and spun around. In his surprise, his wings spread out. "What manner of being are you?"

"You should know."

While Crawly regarded his magnificent wings with interest, it angered him that he no longer had the soft down and pearly plumage. It angered him that the angel should judge him, who crawls on the ground. But more than that, it angered him that the angel dared try to stop the ultimate act of freewill. No one should be denied knowledge at any cost, Crawly reasoned.

"Watching the temptation could prove to be a grave error in judgment on your part," Crawley spat out. "Do you not know who I am?"

He side-winded his way, parting the long, blades, making a loose lasso around the angel's feet.

He hated the curse already. _Tasting dirt and grass! Bah!_

The moment the demon clearly saw the angel's heel in front of him, he sank his fangs into the angel's tender flesh.

"Ouch! Stop that!" scolded the angel.

The angel tried to jump away, but Crawly was coiled too tightly around his feet.The end of his long agile body squeezed the angel's legs together, hobbling him.

"Yes-s-s, the advantages," the demon hissed to himself. Crowley coiling around and around the angel's legs winding higher and higher until he had the angel bound from his ankles to his thighs.

"What are you doing? Stop!" the angel cried out indignantly.

The angel frantically hopped and shimmied. With both hands he frantically tried to pry free of the serpent's hold, but Crawley only clenched his coils tighter. 

Crawly enjoyed twisting into the angel's soft, milky thighs. He poked his head higher, until he reached the angels curly, fine pubic hairs and burrowed his face there. He loved the moist heat that radiated from the angel. He felt its intensity increase with every nudge. Ah! The angel enjoyed how he nosed around in his angelic, creamy folds.

"Stop!" The angel whimpered pitifully.

Although the angel's hands were free to stop the demon, he no longer pulled at Crawly's length. He groaned and pulled at the grass instead. Crawly took that as permission to flick out his forked tongue and taste the sweet ambrosia betwixt the angel's heavenly thighs.

"Oh, sweet heavens!" the angel cried out.

Crawly continued to lick as the angel gasped. Then without any warning, the angel grasped behind the serpent's neck and drew his head out from under the angel's robes.

"Please, no more," the angel pleaded.

Crawly noted the soft, delicate flush of the angel's cheeks and the rapid rise and fall of his chest. He was correct. The angel enjoyed this, but was denying himself the pleasure. Crawly decided to play along.

"Naughty angel. Spying on us. You want to learn of good and evil? I will teach you my abridged version. That's what you came to witness," Crawley said. "I think it only fair."

He drew the end of his tail around the angel's ankles tighter, locking them together. Despite the angel trying to balance himself with his wings, Crowley pulled him to the ground with a thud.

"Get off me you serpent, you!" The angel struggled in protest.

"Serpent? Would I be more appealing to you in my other form?"

With that, he became Crawly the man (or demon in a man's form). At first he languidly sprawled out over the top of the angel, but when the angel tried to roll away, Crawly straddled him and pinned his arms to the ground above his head.

"What do you think you're doing? You cannot molest me! I am the Angel of the Eastern Gate!"

"I already have, but I'm not done with you. Not yet. You may be an angel, but you seek to deny yourself earthly pleasures. I can and I will show you them to you."

"I have no such desire!" he said.

"Of course you would say that. I understand that you might not want to look bad to those Above."

"No. That is not why! Leave me, you serpent."

Crawly laughed and licked at the angel's neck.

"It matters not," he whispered in the angel's ear. "I will have you. You shall not escape. I can do it in this form, in my other, or both, but I will know you."

The angel proved to be much stronger and far more wily than the demon expected. He put on a convincing show for those Upstairs. Convincing enough that Crawly began to wonder if this wasn't an act at all. He had to use his all his preternatural serpent strength and agility to divest the angel of his robes. As Crawly parted the angel's legs, a soft cry escaped his pink lips.

The moment he'd bitten the angel, he'd wanted more. It was only fair in the demon's mind. Why should he deny himself this? He wanted to pull the angel's innocent blond curls tight in his fists and coil his fingers in them. He wanted pinch those rosy cheeks, sink his fangs into those pouty-pink cherub lips.

His long slender cock sought out the angel's flowery opening. He reveled upon entering the soft, tight found-heat. The angel gasped and fought so brilliantly as the demon plunged in and out.

Yet with every thrust, the demon felt the bitter tang of regret. He would much rather have had the angel admit he wanted him. Alas, that could never be. Therefore, Crawly took what he could.

They both came as the angel beat his wings fruitlessly against the ground. Crawly would relive that moment in his mind for hundreds of years.


	2. Chapter 2

It was at the Ark where the demon found him once again. The angel stood majestically, robes flowing, just as magnificent as the demon remembered. He felt an ache deep inside of his chest. What was that? Shame? Guilt? As a demon, he shouldn't feel any regret over what he'd done, but there it was.

They'd spoken only once since the Garden. Crawly was surprized to find that the angel had forgiven him. The angel had even revealed his name to Crawly.

"My name is Aziraphale, and you can't help what you are," he had said. "It's your nature to do evil."

He really didn't like that reply even if it was mostly true. During those times in Chaos after his fall, Crawly had detested his lot. When he got the stint to tempt Adam and Eve, he'd hated Paradise, but he loved Earth. Hearing that Aziraphale believed it was his nature to ravage Aziraphale was what prompted Crawly to change his name. But it wasn't his nature—it was his choice.

As he quietly watched the angel observe the animals entering two-by-two, he wondered what this was really all about. Nothing was ever simple, and it didn't seem to be a good idea putting two of each animal in the same boat. They were pacified for the time being, but what of later. Some would be feasting on the others, and that _was_ in their nature.

Crowley crept silently around the angel. The demon inside him could help but delight at startling Aziraphale. The angel was simply so luscious when he jumped in surprise and his hands covered his mouth.

"What is this, some sort of new form of traveling zoo?" Crowley said. "I hope they've planned for separate compartments."

"I don't know if that was in the specifications. I think he only told Noah 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high. Other than that, Noah had to wing it."

"Hmm. Seems a bit cramped. What's the rush? A few weeks and he could improve the accommodations," Crowley observed.

"From what I hear, God's a bit tetchy. Wiping out the human race. Big storm coming."

The angel's reaction bothered Crowley. Aziraphale stood unmoved by the spectacle and its consequences. Angel's should be more concerned about mass destruction than this, even if it is being brought on by the Almighty. Maybe Crowley had misunderstood.

"All of them?" he asked.

"Not everybody, just the locals." Aziraphale frowned into the sun. "This part of the world."

This was uncalled for, destroying all that lived except for it seemed these chosen few that who was it? Noah? selected—all because of what? It had to be a bit of sinning.

"But what about the kids?" Crowley said. "You can't kill kids. That's something more my lot would do."

"You can't judge the Almighty," Aziraphale replied. "He is sparing Noah and his family, and after that he is going to put up this new thing called a rainbow."

"How kind."

Maybe the angel wasn't completely unmoved by it all. He didn't stay to watch, and as far as judging, of course Aziraphale wouldn't. He didn't even judge Crowley who took the angel's innocence. At least Crowley assumed he was innocent. Maybe not. He seen him flirt with Gabriel that time before he personally Fell.

He left to go to higher ground, but he didn't stay to see the destruction. Where Aziraphale flew off to, he wasn't certain. He knew that he longed for the angel's company although Crowley would never say such a thing aloud and only admitted it to himself on days when Beelzebub nagged for a full report on what evil deeds he done recently in the world.

\----------------

Crowley only came because he knew that Aziraphale would be there. He wasn't much interested in watching Moses part the Rea Sea, but any chance to catch a glimpse of those rosy cheeks, plump lips, and blonde glistening curls, Crowley was taking it.

"I didn't expect to find you here," Aziraphale said as watched from Pi Hahiroth.

"And miss this? Pretty impressive." But Crowley wasn't watching the sight below. He was slipping behind the angel to watch his hips sway and recalling what it was like to taste between those thighs. "How is Moses going to manage those soldiers?"

"With the Almighty's help." Aziraphale turned to Crowley.

"I thought the Almighty only helps those who help themselves."

"Moses has done plenty! I suppose you came for the death and mayhem, or at least for the chaos that follows?"

"Well, the tossed chariots and the bodies of countless Egyptian soldiers littering the seashore are a real incentive, but what I'm really here for is the marine life that will be temporarily uncovered."

Aziraphale raised an eye bow, and he gave Crowley his mischievous smile. He blushed.

Crowley hated himself. He hated what he'd done because he looked at Aziraphale, and he still wanted him. With the wind blowing his curls, watched the angel spread his wings. He joined him, spreading his raven feathers out. Aziraphale's eyes widened in admiration as Crowley fanned them both.

Aziraphale gave a small sigh. Even more than wanting the angel, Crowley wanted Aziraphale to want him back. When the angel looked at him this way, Crowley thought it was possible. The heat spread within him. He wanted more.

After the spectacle, he followed the angel, hoping that angel would say some word of interest. He did not. Still, Crowley followed in the shadows where ever the angel went afterward.

\----------------

"We really shouldn't keep meeting like this," Aziraphale joked. "For a while there, I only I've only seen you at disasters, or is something going to happen here that I don't know about?"

"No. Just visiting. Thought I'd take in some of the gladiator games at the Colosseum."

"How positively barbaric! I'd rather sip wine. It wine is excellent. Why don't you join me?"

Crowley didn't understand why the angel wanted to have anything to do with him, but he was happy that he did.

Aziraphale sighed. "There you go again, getting that far-off look in your eyes. Still feeling guilty, are you? You shouldn't." Aziraphale began to whisper. "In fact, you could do it again. I must resist. It's expected. An angel can't..."

"Enjoy it?" That put it all in an entirely different celestial light. He could have him?

"Shhhhh! Someone might hear."

Crowley spent the next two decades thinking about what Aziraphale had said. He followed the angel thinking about it night and day. He couldn't stop the idea of having the angel beneath him. Isn't this what he hoped for? Aziraphale wants him. He can't say he wants him. He's an angel and not allowed to enjoy it—at least not with a demon. He'd wanted Aziraphale to want him.

He couldn't make himself do this. What kind of demon was he? He was supposed to do vile deeds. He should be able to defile an angel.

Centuries passed. Aziraphale continued to drop hints with sly looks, but Crowley couldn't. He couldn't. Not even after he suggested that they take over each other's duties for convenience sake. It was fun blessing people for the angel. He didn't think Aziraphale much liked the whole cursing others. But that was the deal they'd made.

It wasn't until that he found Aziraphale in the Bastille that Crowley began to think he could do this. In these surroundings, he could take Aziraphale. He was shackled and incredibly lovely.

Aziraphale's eyes grew wide as he saw what the demon was thinking.

"Crowley. Please. I'm helpless," Aziraphale said. "You cannot! No. Oh, don't."

His voice trembled. To anyone who overheard, it might sound as if he were terrified, but Crowley saw the angel's eyes. His lips may have quivered, his body may have shook, and his knees did draw protectively into his chest, but his eyes burned with the heat of a thousand suns.

"Please don't hold me down and force yourself on me," the angel pleaded, but his eyes burned.

Crowley sighed. Shouldn't he do this.

"I'm helpless," Aziraphale repeated. "Completely helpless against your demon ways. Please. I am an angel. It's positively blasphemous! Preying on my innocence again. You simply cannot have me! Don't! Do not lower your breeches and show me your huge cock."

Crowley did exactly as the angel directed. His cock popped out and the angel eyes grew wide, and he licked his lips.

"Just lie still and relax," Crowley said. "I'll make this feel good for you."

"No! Do not use your hypnotic snaky wiles on me!"

"Quiet, angel. This serpent will make you sing."

Crowley untied the front of the angel's breeches then yanked them down the angel's thighs to his shackled ankles. The angel's whole body slackened beneath him, and Crowley spread the angel's thighs apart as he positioned himself between them.

Crowley moaned when he pushed inside.

"Be good and quit fighting me," he said even though the angel was holding perfectly still as Crowley rocked into him. "You feel so soft and tight. Lie still and relax. I can keep doing this for as long as I wish." Crowley wished for it to last forever or at least until the End of Time.

Aziraphale closed his eyes tight with a ghost of a smile on his lips.

Crowley felt his own toes curling and flexing as the angel's sweet tightness massaged his cock. The heat in his belly was building like a furnace.

"That's it, my angel, keep quiet and still."

Beneath him, Aziraphale squeaked out a sound of frustration and impatience. Crowley reached around and pulled the angel's fat cock. He squirmed and jangled the chains that bound his wrists.

Crowley snapped his hips and pounded into Aziraphale. He gloried in the feel of the the angel's plump cock pulsing in his hand. He gave it an evil little twist of his wrist to punctuate each thrust.

”That's it, my beautiful angel," he cooed. "I can feel it deep inside you. It's not your fault I've brought you to this. Don't withhold it from me. Come."  
  
A few more thrusts, and they exploded in rapturous spasms.

After, Crowley reluctantly released the angel from his shackles.

"Thank you," the angel said. "You saved me from having my body disincorporated."

"I wouldn't want anything to happen to your body," Crowley said. "Or you."

He realized he'd revealed far too much of himself with those words.

"Let's say we get out of here," Crowley suggested. "Why ever were you in this place?"

"There is simply no decent place to get a crepe in London."


	3. Chapter 3

Aziraphale nodded to him over the table as the waiter took away their plates. The candles flickered as the angel took another sip from his wine glass. Crowley brushed off his trousers and sighed. He wanted this, but as always, the angel had to pretend. A charade. What was the game to be tonight? Would it be one of those rare occasions where he let Crowley in?

Crowley turned his empty glass with his hand as Aziraphale dabbed his lips off daintily with his napkin. How could the angel so easily compartmentalize what they were to each other? How did Aziraphale manage to pretend to not want it, not to enjoy it? Crowley struggled—oh, how he struggled!

"I was wondering," Aziraphale said, setting down the napkin, "if you'd like a looky-loo at my newly acquired bookshop. Maybe I could tempt you with a glass of wine or two?"

 _Ahh,_ Crowley thought. _There it was._

"I can never resist temptation," said Crowley slyly.

Invitation delivered and accepted. Oh, how Crowley pined after the angel. For thousands of years he followed him across history. Long, long ago, he'd accepted his fascination with Aziraphale. From the beginning with the first addictive taste, Crowley fell in a completely different way. This Fall was harder, farther, and ineffable—as ineffable as the Grand Plan, but Crowley would never say it.

With a saucy wink, Aziraphale fluffed the ruffles on his blouse as he stood. They both pushed their chairs back into the table, and the demon walked side-by-side out the door of the restraunt with the angel and through the streets of Soho.

Always such proximity. The angel continued to bump shoulders against him, always remaining close. Crowley calculated that Aziraphale knew exactly what he was doing as his hands idly brushed against Crowley's sleeve.

Yet Crowley still questioned himself. Why did he feel he could never dare to say to Aziraphale that he wanted more than a moment's passion? As their heels clicked hollowly against the pavement, Crowley thought it would take some sort of miracle that he wasn't capable of producing.

Although he reasoned that intimacy could never be possible, it didn't stop him from desiring it. Even as their relationship stood, their meetings were friendly, and Crowley often worried what would happen if they were found out. He'd kept those dark thoughts to himself. He'd considered asking for Holy Water. If there was no other way, it would be quicker than what would happen to him in Hell. With what his heart felt for the angel, he worried for Aziraphale as well. He knew that the angel had no choice but to deny him.

Crowley liked the bookstore immediately. It was cluttered and chaotic with stacks upon stacks of books the angel had collected. Crowley immediately noticed the titles. All were books the angel cherished.

Aziraphale proudly lead Crowley into the backroom of his bookstore. _What was this?_ There sat an old oak table with two chairs. On the table was a bottle of wine with two carefully folded napkins with wine glasses next to them. Crowley felt a pang of heat inside his chest. _He'd planned for them._

They sat down and drank the bottle, and another. After they'd had more to drink than a demon and angel should, Crowley wondered how much longer he'd have to wait for Aziraphale to drop a clue. Since both completely and thoroughly plastered, he didn't want to miss it. 

"I read s-somewhere that s-snakes have two penises. Is that true?" Aziraphale asked.

Crowley wondered in his blurred mind if this was what he'd been waiting for.

"I was a serpent, not a snake. Not the same. And I was a demon in serpent form, so only have one penis, thank you very much." Crowley stood up, or more like wobbled. He looked down at the angel who feigned shirking back in his chair.

It had been long ago, but certainly Aziraphale must remember that first time.

"You aren't going to use them on me again, are you?"

"Only one, little angel. And I will, I promise you." Crowley licked his lips.

"No, no, don't," Aziraphale whimpered.

He should be on a stage, Crowley thought. Shakespeare had loved him, but could never get him to act. Pity.

"Oh, so you don't like this?" Crowley asked. He stepped in front of Aziraphale, his crotch in the angel's face. "You invited me here. Maybe I _should_ make you fuck me?"

Crowley raised his eyebrow, then took one step back to look at the expression on the angel's face. His eyes were wide, his Aziraphale's jaw dropped open.

"You can't make me do that!" Aziraphale exclaimed.

"Oh, but I can, little angel. I can make you do it. You'll obey me. If you don't, I will kill thousands of innocent people. Do you want that to happen?"

"No," Aziraphale said. Crowley loved how the angel's nostrils flared as Crowley rolled his hips. He looked up at Crowley from under his eyelashes as he squirmed beneath the demon's hard gaze.

Crowley raised a finger in warning. It didn't work.Aziraphale jumped up, trying to escape. Crowley caught his arm and pushed him against the table. They stood nose to nose.

"You will fuck me. I command it," Crowley growled.

"Only this once. Never again," the angel said meekly.

"You can't trust me to promise you that," Crowley crooned. He leaned into the angel, letting him feel his interest that was aching to escape his trousers. "I want you to fuck me over this."

"My table! But I eat here!"

Crowley grabbed Aziraphale's shoulders and spun him around, switching places. Now he was leaning into the table with the angel in front of him.

"And I drank here." He patted the table top in back of him. "Problem?"

Crowley then began to unbutton his flies. He shimmied his leather trousers off his slim hips. Aziraphale took one step back, watching.

"It's the perfect place," said Crowley. "That way you'll think of me daily."

Aziraphale gasped as Crowley's cock spilled out. Crowley gave a wicked grin. Crowley turned around and lay over the table with his bum in the air.

"Take me, angel."

Aziraphale gave out a cry of disbelief, but Crowley was delighted that the angel did as he was ordered. He heard the gentle whooshing of clothing being discarded and felt the fine hairs on the angel's legs as he stepped between the demon's. The luscious sound of lips smacking filled the demon's ears. Aww. The angel had slipped his fingers inside his mouth and pulled them out with a pop.

Crowley was rewarded with angel’s smooth fingers that deliriously pushed and probed inside to test his limits.

He moaned. "That's not what I want, angel."

With that, Aziraphale slowly pressed his plump cock against his hole and pushed himself inside.

Crowley groaned in delight as he felt the delectable burn. He braced his arms against the table as he gasped out. "Defile me, angel. Pound me. Make me beg."

Aziraphale did as directed. The table dug into his hip bones, but Crowley didn't mind. He was finally being taken by Aziraphale. 

"Use me," Crowley commanded. "Hold nothing back. Show me how you feel about me." The words twisted inside Crowley's head. _How I feel...does Aziraphale understand what I mean?_

The angel whimpered in answer and instead of his hips snapping harder, he slowed. He gently rocked into the demon, the dreamy tempo deliberately moderated. The aching pace altered his heart's rhythm within Crowley's chest, each beat pounded time to the stuttered throb of the angel's thrust.

Crowley closed his eyes briefly, concentrating on what was possibly behind this change. He felt the angel's shaft deepen. He didn't think it possible to feel this full and complete. His eyes fell shut again.

In one final breath, he called out Aziraphale's name.

A hot stream of angel semen filled the insides of Crowley as the angel whispered his name in return.

Crowley's own come christened the table. Crowley slowly turned. He wasn't he only one with his eyes shut. "You can open them, angel."

The angel blinked at Crowley.

"Why so grim?" Crowley asked. "No one saw you. It's only me."

"Shhhh! Crowley, no!" He said, pressing his finger to the demon's lips. "They'll hear!"

Crowley bowed his head and wished...oh, how he wished...that he didn't have to pretend.


	4. Chapter 4

When Crowley finally spoke his heart, they were at Regent's Park, walking side by side along the pond. They'd just come from a quick blow job at the bookstore. After a coy suggestion from Aziraphale, Crowley had threatened to turn Big Ben to dust if Aziraphale didn't go down on his knees that instant and suck his demon cock.

Aziraphale dropped down so hard, his knees popped. Watching the angel kneeling in front of him, Crowley last scrap of resolve melted. It slipped out Crowley's mouth. Afterward as they strolled through the park, Aziraphale continued to pretend that the three words were never spoken.

Aziraphale removed his hat and threw out breadcrumbs.

 _Only crumbs. Maybe that was all he was to the angel._ Crowley couldn't believe it, didn't want to believe it. As the ducks bobbed for the bits of crust, Crowley couldn't help but think that the angel's meager affections were but crumbled bread tossed out from time to time.

It had taken Crowley thousands of years to come to this. He could withhold it no longer. He patted the note in his pocket.

"What I'd said earlier...humans say it all of the time," Crowley said plainly.

"We're not human, and you're a..."

"Demon?"

Crowley watched as the angel closed his eyes to collect himself. The ducks in the pond swam around in circles. It seemed to Crowley that was the way—always paddling around each other, never getting anywhere and settling for scraps.

"People do this who care for each other. I'm not playing this game with you anymore. This needs to be real," Crowley demanded.

"Quiet! They'll hear you." Aziraphale looked to Heaven.

"Do you really think they're listening and watching?" Crowley shook his head. "If they were, _this...we._..would have ended long ago."

As the demon handed him the note, genuine curiosity filled Aziraphale's eyes. They stood but a few feet apart, but to Crowley it seemed miles.

Crowley held his breath as Aziraphale slowly unfolded it and read. Crowley's chest tightened as he saw the angel frantically shaking his head. When the angel raised his eyes to meet Crowley's, the demon realized the change. Gone was the gentle desire within them, instead a yawning fear and anger was fixed inside.

Asking for love was difficult enough, but the Holy Water may have pushed the angel over the edge.

"I'll never give you any of this!" Aziraphale spat out venomously. Looking into his eyes, Crowley could have sworn the angel was the snake instead of him. "You think after what you've done that you and I could ever possibly have some sort of relationship? You make this sound so easy...so, so easy, peasy. It is not. You are a demon and I am an angel."

"It could be that easy peasy! If you wanted it." Crowley took a step closer.

"No. I will never give this to you," said Aziraphale and backed away. He planted his hat firmly back on his head. "It would mean my Fall, and most certainly the end of you. I will not give you the means to your own destruction!"

Crowley stepped toward him again. The angel needed to understand. "You really think they're watching! No one sees, no one cares! Do you think what we _do_ even matters?"

"It did once." Aziraphale stood his ground, frowning.

"That was long ago and in the beginning. Now, we just report back. A miracle here, a disaster there. No one minds what happens down here on Earth. To them it's about the Apocalypse! Which as you well know, is always, always just around the corner and never appears."

Aziraphale shook his head. "It can't be. We can't be. You must know that."

"Tell me you don't care. Tell me you don't love me."

Aziraphale said nothing.

"Then if you can't say it, give me the Holy Water."

The angel wadded the note up in his hand. "I will not! Why do you even need it?"

“In case things go South.” Crowley held out his hand. "A friend would at least do that."

"I am most certainly not your friend."Aziraphale took the crumpled up note and flung it into the pond.

Crowley’s mouth fell open. He closed his eyes. This was it then?

"I don't want you," the demon lied. "I don't need you. From this point on, I don't even know who you are."

Not even crumbs, Crowley thought as he stared at the ducks—a bitter ache in his chest. He set the note on fire.

"You don't even love yourself. I don't even know you," Aziraphale said. "I guess I never knew you."

Angels don't lie. At least not out loud. They do on occasion lie to themselves. Crowley knew he hoped that was the case, but what did it matter, if Aziraphale didn't believe in them?

\------------

Try as he might, Crowley couldn't leave his angel alone. Sure he lost track of the angel when he slept away a few decades at a time, but Crowley always woke up and followed the angel. Aziraphale had kept the bookstore, but he'd updated the storefront. Aziraphale had it painted purple and hung a dapper sign with gold lettering that said: "A.Z. Fell and Co., Antiquarian and Unusual Books." By the grumbles and frowns of those leaving his establishment, the angel still made no attempt to sell one of his beloved books.

Crowley kept to London. Tired of landlords who asked far too many questions about his personal sleeping habits, he acquired a clean, uncluttered yet stylish flat in Mayfair.

It took a second World War and time before Crowley found himself hot-footing through a church to save his friend's sorry angel arse. Crowley had hoped that saving him along with the Aziraphale's prized books would win a piece of the angel's heart.

Still no Holy Water and no words of love. It took Crowley trying to procure the Holy Water himself before Aziraphale gifted him with a Tartan Thermos filled to the brim. Any words of affection, however, remained unsaid between them.

But Crowley could never walk away. Not ever. Instead of saying the words aloud, he silently repeated them to himself.

He continued to take what small gifts Aziraphale handed him: books on medieval torture, long, leisurely candlelit dinners along with an exquisitely sore arse. All these small pleasures Aziraphale could give him, but not the one Crowley truly wanted.

It went on like that for decades. Until the Appocolypse.

The Antichrist had been on Earth for fifteen hours. Crowley and Aziraphale had been drinking in the backroom of the Soho bookstore for three. The table (that same table where Aziraphale took Crowley for the first time) was littered with wine bottles. Aziraphale began reminiscing about the Red Sea and Moses.

Crowley interrupted. "I came to see the whales and dolphins. It's hard to get a close look at those creatures. I hate sea water let alone swimming in it." It was hard focusing on his friend across the table after six bottles of wine.

"I don't swim either. But there are ships. Like the Pequod. I recall one particular voyage with a white whale. The captain's name was Ahab. Or was that in a book? They seem so real at times." The angel swirled his wine in his glass, sloshing some over his hand.

"The point is...the point is that..." Crowley was having a difficult time remembering the point. It had been awhile, and he was very drunk. That and the angel looked incredibly beautiful tonight. All three of him. Then there was the Apocolypse. Soon all this would be gone. All of it.

"The point I am trying to make is..." Crowley repeated, "is dolphins. That's my point."

"What about them? They're fish."

"No, no, no!" Crowley said, waving his finger at the angel. "Not fish. Mammals. The difference is that..."

"Mammals? They mate out of water then?" The angel raised an eyebrow.

"No! They have big..."

"Penises?" Aziraphale smirked, then giggled. He seemed to think it hysterically funny.

"Uh? No. At least I don't think so." Crowley couldn't recall what he'd been saying. He did recall that he needed to convince the angel of something, but what it was, it escaped him. "Oh, yes. Brains! The point is the size of...size of...their brains. Big brains. Whales even bigger."

"I should say so. Have you seen how large whales are? Leviathan of the deep, they're called. Gargantuan brains then."

"No, I mean, yes. I mean...propor...propor-ten... Anyway, they have damn big ones. And gorillas. Huge brains." Crowley banged his glass on the table for emphasis. That was it. He remembered. "It's the signal. You know. End of Times."

"You're so gloom and doom."

"Well, that will be it. The sea boiling." Crowley wiped his eyes. He made sure to ham it up. "Poor whales. Poor dolphins. They'll be mixed in the seafood gumbo, bubbling 'round and 'round."

"I don't know what we could do." Aziraphale pouted.

"Do? This will all be gone. No more...feeding pigeons. No more...ice cream. I like ice cream." Crowley wiped back a tear.

"So do I," said Aziraphale. He sniffed pitifully as he stared into his glass.

"No more books." Crowley was proud of himself. No way the angel would want to lose his books.

"So this is it? The Antichrist is here and we just...what?" Aziraphale sighed.

"Raise him," Crowley said. He awkwardly waved his arms as he spoke, narrowly avoiding knocking over his wine glass. "You know, influence him. Tabula...Tabula...Rosie."

"That's Rosa. Let me get this: You want us to raise him? The Antichrist. How could we even do such a thing?"

"As nannies. They really are the ones who raise children. You and I. Together. We can do it. Change it. Free will and all."

"We could raise him. Influence him. It might work! We shall raise a Warlock." Aziraphale smiled, pleased. "Godfathers. Well I'll be damned."

Finally, Crowley thought.

"Being damned isn't so bad once you get used to it," he smiled.


	5. Chapter 5

Nanny Crowley smoothed out a wrinkle in her apron with her hand, then tamed some stray hairs back into the bun on her head.

It was the Antichrist Warlock's eleventh birthday, and there were far too many children giggling, running, and screaming about for Nanny Crowley's liking. Not that she disliked parties...it was children's parties she detested. The only thing good about them was the cake and ice cream. The worst part? Usually the silly games and predictable entertainment: Pin the Tail on the Donkey, Sleeping Lions, balloon twisting clowns and presto-chango magicians.

It was worse because Aziraphale insisted on becoming the entertainment.

She'd tried her best to talk the angel of this, but he'd insisted. He simply had to do his magic card tricks! Any opportunity Aziraphale had to perform slight of hand for an audience, the angel took it. But these unruly children! This party was worse than any Hellish inferno that the demon had ever stepped into.

While the she did appreciate the angel's dexterous hands and he did look rather cute in his dusty old magician's coat and bow tie, she would rather Aziraphale stop trying to pull a rabbit out of his hat and stick to real miracles.

"You should be happy. It's our anniversary of sort," Aziraphale said. "No longer pretending."

Over the last years as Godparents, life had changed for them. The gardener and the nanny—a happily married couple: the angel, the doting husband and Nanny Crowley, his wife. While Aziraphle was correct that they no longer were pretending behind the closed doors of their cozy little carriage house, they were still pretending. AND Aziraphale still was afraid to say those three words. Crowley told herself that they didn't need to speak them—after all, they both felt them. That was enough, wasn't it?

Some anniversary...the End of the World was at hand, and she was wearing stockings that kept creeping down her bloody hips.

"It was in your pocket," Warlock said to Aziraphale the Magnificant (the angel tried to make everyone call him that, but Crowley drew the line in bed).

"So it was," said Aziraphale, who pulled a lad's nose with a loud honk. The lad didn't like that much and stomped on Aziraphale the Magnificant's foot.

"Just one more trick!" the magician exclaimed, hopping about.

Crowley covered her face. "Don't," she said.

 _Whoosh!_ Cream cake sailed past Nanny Crowley's head and, _Splatt!_ smacked into the angel's face. Big creamy gobs plopped off his nose and on to his coat. The children pointed and laughed hysterically.

Aziraphale sighed and removed his handkerchief from his coat pocket, except it was one of his color-changing scarves. Purple, orange, yellow, and green tied together, spilled from his coat pocket. He wiped off his face with the yellow end of it as the children continued to whoop and holler.

"You're rubbish at this," said Warlock. "I wanted cartoons anyway. You're no magician. You're just the Mr. Fell, the gardener. I want to unwrap the presents!"

Nanny Crowley was waiting for the gifts or THE Gift. The dog. The bloody Hound of Hell. It would fit right in with this party filled with dancing demons. But Warlock got a gerbil. In a cage with a maze. From his parents. Warlock wasn't amused.

"Something is not right. No dog," observed Aziraphale.

"Could you make it a dog?" asked Warlock. "You're supposed to be a magician."

Nanny Crowley shook her head. Although Aziraphale could miracle one, it wouldn't be the Hell Hound.

Maybe a dove would do?

"Abracadabra!" said Aziraphale with gusto. The little girl next to him screamed as he pulled the limp bird from his hat. Aziraphale quickly shoved it up his sleeve.

"Blood," said Warlock. "Cool."

"Not cool," scolded Aziraphale.

Crowley wrinkled her nose as she pulled Aziraphale by the front of his magician's coat and around the house.

"That's not a dead dove?" she asked leading him to the driveway and her Bentley.

Aziraphale nodded weakly. "I'm afraid so."

"I suppose it's better than the last time with the dead rabbit," said Crowley. "You had a difficult time stuffing that up your sleeve."

"Here, hand me your coat." Crowley helped the angel off with it and gently removed dove from the sleeve. She brought it up to her lips, breathing life back into it. She thought the gesture might impress the angel.

"Do you think I was that bad?" asked Aziraphale. He bit his lip and sighed.

Crowley held the coat out to the angel. "We really need to be concentrating on why the dog isn't here not your skills as a...magician." Crowley sighed. "Oh, get in the car. And wipe the cream cake from your trousers before getting inside."

\------------

"We've never had sex in your Bentley." The angel was fiddling with the knobs. Crowley hated it when anyone fiddled with his knobs.

"Whatever are you talking about? Armagedon is around the corner, and you want to have relations in my car?" Crowley slapped the angel's hand away.

"Exactly. No time like the present—if fact, there may be no time soon, so I think we should."

"These are leather seats!And you've still got cream cake on you!" Crowley shouted.

"Very well, but I do think I would feel much safer if you stopped car, or at least slowed down."

"You want to have sex with me just to keep me from driving?" Instead of slowing, he stomped on the gas and bolted through an intersection. "We need to address the Dog. No dog, remember?"

"Very well," the angel said. He gripped the seat as they made a fast turn. "I've been thinking...what if...something happened in the hospital? A muck up."

"Nah. It couldn't have. It was filled with our people."

"What people? Those Satanists?" Aziraphale laughed, then covered his face. "Watch out for that pedestrian!"

"I don't think they could have messed it up. How? Swapping two babies...I mean, it wasn't a difficult task...was it?"

From the corner of his eye, Crowley watched Aziraphale slowly removed his hand and stare at Crowley. Maybe the angel was right. Maybe...

Crowley pulled to the curb and stopped the car. In his memory he saw it all: the small nun, a bit of dolt for a Satanist, then there was someone else pacing, pacing...he recalled the smell of cheap pipe tobacco and an ugly cardigan pacing the hallway. An expectant father.

"There _was_ a third baby," Crowley blurted out. "We have to find it."

"A third? But where? Oh, I never thought I'd ask you to do this but start the car, start the car!" said Aziraphale waving his arms. "We haven't much time."

The Bentley jerked to life. "Hospital records will be the first place to look."

In a blink, Crowley the Nanny was no more. Black leather coat, skin tight trousers and open white silk shirt had returned. And his goggles. Crowley loved them. Everytime he put them on he silently thanked Leonardo.

As the Bentley weaved through the thick traffic, Crowley the Demon was bent on a mission.

"Then what?" Aziraphale asked.

"We have to stop it. Some how."

"Please slow down! You can't drive 90 miles an hour in Central London! We can't stop him if we're both disencorporated."

\--------------------

In the end, the Antichrist found them on an airfield, and together they managed to stop war between Heaven and Hell.

The Antichrist's name was Adam. Of all the names! Crowley had to laugh at the irony. And how Adam stood up to his father.

The bookstore was burned to the ground, his Bentley destroyed. Worse, the wrath of Heaven and Hell was upon them. Crowley supposed they could go back to his flat. But they waited on the bench in Regent's Park for the judgment to come down on them. Crowley feared they'd never see each other again. He'd never hear the words he longed to hear.

"I can't believe it's all gone," said the angel. "My bookshop, your car, by...books."

"I saved this page," Crowley said. "From Agnes Nutter's book."

Aziraphale's eyes glistened as he turned his head to Crowley. "You...saved this."

Crowley handed the charred page to the angel.

Aziraphale tilted up his head to read through his spectacles. "Prophecy 5004: When alle is fayed and all is done, ye must choofe your faces wisely, for soon enouff ye will be playing with fyre."

"What does that even mean?" asked Crowley. But the moment Aziraphale's eyes widened, Crowley understood.

_______________

"It worked, it worked, it worked! I can't believe it worked!" exclaimed Aziraphale.

A car whizzed past and Crowley grabbed the angel by the leather jacket.

"That was close! Are you trying to get my body disencorporated?" the demon asked.

Although the angel did look rather odd jumping about like that inside his own frame, the demon did want his body back intact.

He was starting to get used to being in the angel's form. When he was hustled into Heaven, he certainly had enjoyed the utter shock on Gabriel's face when he stepped into the inferno and basked in the heat of Hell. He wished he could have been in Hell to see Aziraphale in in his form, bathing and splashing in Holy Water. He said he even had a rubber ducky.

Now, at least they'll be left alone...

"But look! Don't you see? It's my bookstore! It's back!"

But Crowley wasn't looking at the bookstore. He'd missed it as he'd pulled the angel to safety. It was parked just down the street...his Bentley. They both walked across, Aziraphale staring at his store and Crowley at his car. As he walked along side it, Crowley ran Aziraphale's fingers lovingly across the polished hood while the angel raced up to the double doors. He turned around before entering to see what kept the demon lagging behind.

"Oh, Crowley. _It's your car_!"

"This calls for a celebration. Let's go inside, shall we?"

"Let's."

To Crowley, it looked the same. Almost. There were books that Crowley didn't recall being there, on law, finance, romance novels! Maybe he never noticed them before this. He certainly never had seen himself through another's eyes until now. It was most enlightening.

He watched how lovingly Aziraphale treated his body. Yes, he had run into the street willy-nilly, but that was his nature. The angel unbuttoned his jacket with care, and set it aside with respect and reverence. He picked a copy of Shakespeare's sonnets, and the angel caressed the binding as he stepped up to Crowley.

They stood in the center of the shop. Crowley had to do it. Had to open them up.

"I miss my white wings," Crowley said. "Yours are so magnificent."

Every cell in Crowley vibrated within the angel as he urged the wings to unfold and expand. He stretched them out, his borrowed fingertips touched the downy feathers.

"At last you addressed me as Magnificent."

"Your wings, not your slight of hand."

"Yours are dark and handsome," replied Aziraphale expanding Crowley's raven wings. The tips touched, and they both shivered. "Like you...or I should I say me?"

"I think I might like to kiss myself on the lips," said Crowley.

"That is something I would enjoy in both bodies."

Crowley did. Kiss himself. It was the oddest thing. "I have chapped lips."

"You don't...or I mean, I don't..." Aziraphale voice was far off as he reached out and touched his own lips.

"You know this is the ultimate in kink...having sex with yourself in your lover's body." Crowley couldn't help suggesting it. It was a much better idea than Aziraphale's having sex in the Bentley.

Aziraphale held out Crowley's hand, and Crowley took it.

Wings caressed bodies and pulses fluttered. Clothing and feathers floated lazily to the floor. Hands that belonged to the other danced across satin skin and silken scales. They lifted off of the floor.

"We've never made love in the air," Aziraphale said.

"We've never called it making love."

"We should have."

His own voice sounded so sweet coming from the angel. How was that possible? His own hands weren't his own. His heart? He wondered how it was beating right at this moment.

He'd changed forms before. He'd gone from serpent to human, and he'd lived in as a man, and she'd lived as a woman. Aziraphale had already jumped from himself to Madame Tracy and back to his own form again only to find himself inside Crowley's lean figure. Some how, they'd managed to keep the bodies.

He wondered how the angel felt as he touched him. His _sweet_ angel.

"I love you," Crowley whispered to his own form. "I'm sorry. Sorry for forcing you, sorry for trying to make you choose. I'm sorry."

They hovered in the center of the story between the bookcases near the Victorian Gothic section. How appropriate.

Aziraphale answered from his own lips. "Shhh. I've always known and always cared. This...we...were ineffable."

"Hmmm." He kissed himself again. "Yes."

"And I was afraid, but I am no longer afraid, my dear Crowley. I didn't understand how much, but I do...I do. I love you."

Warm hands skimmed across his chest. Shimmers of light came from within them both like the sun breaking out from behind the clouds. How was this happening?

"I don't think my face has ever made that particular expression. What is it?" asked Crowley.

"It's contentment." The angel's snake eyes fluttered shut. "Crowley, it is time. For you could not fully love until you loved yourself." 

Crowley felt the heat of Aziraphale's cheeks from within as the glow from within increased. They were warmer than his ever were, and the angel's heart pounded like a bass drum inside his chest. He reached out and grasped his own hand. They were soft. He chuckled—Holy Water must be an excellent emollient.

Had it really been this simple all along? To love himself first?

"Please, make love to me."

"With pleasure, my dear boy."

Aziraphale's parts were different, feeling the angel enter then fill this tight velvet lining tingled him from his toes to the tip of his nose. He gasped and trembled. Black and white wings beat together against the bookcases, showering books across the floor.

"Careful!" cried Aziraphale. 

"This is all so, so wonderful," said Crowley, "but I think I'd like to finish this in my body. These books are digging into my back."

"Agreed." The angel wrapped his legs around Crowley and kissed him. With a gasp, it was done. They had returned.

"Please, don't stop!" Aziraphale begged.

The light was still with them, still shining bright from inside. Joined together in mid-air, Crowley heaved and came with the angel pulsing around his cock. They crashed to the floor in the pile of books.

"You're cleaning this up," Aziraphale said.

"Of course."

"That was..."

"Incredible. Feeling like yourself again?" Crowley raised his eyebrow. He missed doing that. The angel's brow just wasn't as flexible. "Good to be in my old body. You treated it well, except for all of those cream puffs. Too many cream puffs." He hugged the angel.

"We were meant to happen." The angel hugged him back and smiled into the demon's neck.

"I thought it was Free Will..."

"You say potato, and I say potahto..." laughed Aziraphale. He sat up in the pile of books, carefully pushing a copy of _Caterbury Tales_ aside.

"Well, it's too late to call the whole thing off. And I would never want to do it."

"Right you are. How about dinner then? A celebration is in order."

"Yes. We're now officially ineffable husbands..." Crowley added and held out his hand.

"But you never proposed." Aziraphale batted his eyes.

"I propose we remain together for the rest of time—however long that is."

"I accept." Aziraphale took Crowley's hand. The demon hoped he'd never let go.

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on Tumblr: [**elwinglyre Tumblr**](https://elwinglyre.tumblr.com/)!


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